Tampons are well known in the art and are used for feminine hygiene. Also many tampon manufacturing methods and apparatuses have been disclosed in the prior art. Tampons, and in particular digital tampons, can be covered by a packaging which preferably closely fits the tampon.
Prior art methods for packaging tampons are mainly directed towards immediately packaging the tampon, i.e. the tampon is present during the manufacturing of its packaging. Document EP1477406A1, for instance, discloses such a packaging method, wherein the tampon is inserted inside a tubular folding spindle of constant cross section; a sheet of packing material is then wrapped about the folding spindle and stabilized longitudinally to form a tubular wrapping; the folding spindle and the tubular wrapping, together with the tampon, are then parted; and the two ends of the tubular wrapping are closed transversely about the relative tampon. Heat sealing of tubular packagings are also known from e.g. EP0970888A1 or U.S. Pat. No. 5,533,323A for cellophaning cigarette packets.
However, the present invention relates to another technique, wherein the packaging is manufactured at least partly, and preferably completely, separate from the tampon, i.e. the packaging is essentially manufactured in a suitable form before it is combined with the tampon. Such a method allows for an optimized total production process of packaged tampons. Indeed, if the tampons are packaged directly, the process of forming the tampons and the process of forming the packages need to be performed inline, whereby the total production process speed needs to be optimized taking into account both processes. The present invention allows the production process for the tampon and the production process for the packaging to be at least partly performed in parallel, such that one is capable of optimizing each process separately, thereby also capable of increasing total process speeds.
One prior art process for manufacturing tampon packagings has been developed by Ruggli. Hereby, a strip of thermoplastic film is supplied at the inlet of a wheel to a holding element and then fixed by a staff or rod shaped clamping means. Once the strip is fixed in position the wheel starts to move about 45° around the rotational axis of the wheel. At the first stop the strip is wrapped around the holding means and both of its ends are heat sealed together (forming a “tube”). After another first 45° spin and second 45° spin the outer part of the hull (the one facing away from the center of the wheel) is heat sealed and closed in two distinct second and third heat sealing stations. The cellophane hull (now having a cylindrical body with one open end) is then released at the outlet of the “cellophane wheel” to another wheel were it will be later combined with the tampon.
The problem with the above described packaging method is that the production speed is not high enough to keep up with present-day production speeds of tampon manufacturing apparatuses. As a result, more than one of the prior art tampon packaging manufacturing apparatuses needs to be combined with a tampon manufacturing apparatus in order to increase total production speed. It should be clear that such a solution to increase total production speed is not ideal.
The inventors therefore have found an improved method and apparatus wherein the packaging production speed of the Ruggli method described above can be substantially improved by up to a factor of 2 and even more.